


Twin Telepathy

by blueecofreak



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-08
Updated: 2015-06-08
Packaged: 2018-04-03 10:59:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4098487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueecofreak/pseuds/blueecofreak
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Dipper stops sleeping. Well, at least Mabel is ninety-eight percent sure he stops sleeping. It’s really flipping hard to say, because for the majority of the night she’s asleep herself, as most living human beings should be, so she can’t exactly monitor him all that closely. However, she’s rolled over to check on her twin more than once long, long after the sun had set, and watched as Dipper flipped through his worn copies of The Sibling Brothers, or combed through the journal furiously as though his life depended on it. So Mabel can say with absolute certainty that her brother hasn’t gotten a good night’s rest since even before what she has taken to calling the infamous Sock Opera Debacle."</p><p>Post-Sock Opera, Dipper coping with the aftermath of a demonic possession. Sibling fluff. Hurt/comfort.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Twin Telepathy

**Author's Note:**

> Whoa! So this is like, the first fanfic I've written in over two years. And it's my first Gravity Falls fanfic ever! I blame the hiatus. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!

Dipper stops sleeping.

Well, at least Mabel is ninety-eight percent sure he stops sleeping. It’s really flipping hard to say, because for the majority of the night she’s asleep herself, as most living human beings should be, so she can’t exactly monitor him all that closely. However, she’s rolled over to check on her twin more than once long, long after the sun had set, and watched as Dipper flipped through his worn copies of The Sibling Brothers, or combed through the journal furiously as though his life depended on it.

So Mabel can say with absolute certainty that her brother hasn’t gotten a good night’s rest since even before what she has taken to calling the infamous Sock Opera Debacle.

Even though she catches on two nights after the show (when Dipper staggers down to the kitchen, bags under the bags under his eyes, and pours himself a glass of syrup while flooding his plate of microwaveable French toast sticks with apple juice; “Geez kid, who beat the junk out of you last night?” Grunkle Stan had asked) Mabel doesn’t confront him. 

Dipper had the tendency to try to avoid his problems in the hopes that they’d eventually go away, and while she preferred to face her issues head on, she knows from experience getting all up in her brother’s business and demanding he tell her what the heck was going on would only lead to him becoming very, very irate, which is the last thing anyone needs. Gravity Falls may be full of magic and monsters and mysteries, but the conundrum that is the rage of an anxious, hormonally unbalanced, and sleep deprived Dipper is something better left untouched. 

So Mabel goes for subtleties. 

Most would think subtlety is not her style, what with, well, her adorkably quirky sense of style and infectious personality. Dazzling hand knit sweaters for every day of the week can give someone an unmistakable reputation for being the exact opposite of subtle. Mabel is aware of how others perceive her, don’t get her wrong, but frankly my dear, she just doesn’t give a dang.

(Besides, she already had a good feeling the thing that was going on was a lot less of a thing and a lot more of a demonic creature known as Cipher comma Bill. Call it common sense, but Mabel’s pretty sure it’s the twin telepathy. All her brother needed was a good’s night sleep and that demonic nacho chip would just seem like a bad dream.)

\---

After breakfast, Mabel puts her first plan into action. They’re in the gift shop, helping Wendy set up for the busy morning ahead. The teenager is talkative this morning, telling the twins about the ridiculous stunt Thompson had pulled last night. 

Mabel is restocking snow globes as she listens to Wendy’s story, although it’s less restocking and more giggling at Waddles as he rolls a globe around with his hooves. Gosh, she loves her pig.

“But yeah, Dipper you totally should have been there, it was hilarious!” Wendy laughs.

Oh crud. Operation: Get Dipper To Go The Heck To Sleep was supposed to be currently underway.

Realizing Waddles distracted her, big time, Mabel looks up to locate her brother in the shop. While she’s been slacking off for the last twenty minutes, Dipper has been hard at work, the broom practically a blur in his hands as he sweeps the ground. 

There’s almost anger in his movements.

Making sure the redheaded teen is out of earshot, Mabel leans over and whispers to her brother. “Hey, Dip. If you give me five bucks, I’ll cover for you today.”

He hardly looks up from his sweeping. “No thanks.”

“Aw, fine. You drive a hard bargain. Two dollars?”

“Go away Mabel,” Dipper mutters, as he rubs his nose with his worn hoodie sleeve. Mabel isn’t sure why he’s wearing the old thing. Sure, she could handle knit sweaters on ninety degree days like it was no problemo! Her brother on the other hand? He was a sweaty mess in shorts and a t-shirt!

“Alright, I’ll admit, you’re good, so for absolutely nothing, I will take care of any tasks you are asked to perform today. You’re getting the Twin Special, but only because you look like you need some rest!”

Dipper’s face pales under the brim of his hat, and Mabel worries that maybe she wasn’t coming off as subtle as she wanted to be. But then, she sees the red dripping down the front of his hoodie and onto the creaky floorboards of the Shack, and before she even knows what she’s doing she’s shouting for Grunkle Stan.

It isn’t Stan that bursts through the door, instead its Soos. “I heard distress, dudes, who is in distress?”

“Dipper’s got a nosebleed,” Wendy answers, making her way towards the tween in question. Mabel is still calling frantically for Stan, Waddles oinking anxiously at her side. 

“Dude, are you alright? What happened?”

“I’m fine I’m fine I’m fine!” Dipper practically shouts, his voice muffled by his hands. Stan finally runs into the gift shop, joining Wendy and Soos by Dipper. Mabel remains rooted to the spot. 

“For the love of- what are you kids doing in here?”

“The little dude needs a day off I think Mr. Pines,” Soos says. “He’s bleeding.”

“Whoa! That’s for sure,” Grunkle Stan mutters, as he looks down at his nephew. He puts his hand on Dipper’s shoulder, guiding him to the door. “C’mon kiddo, let’s get you to the bathroom. Don’t want the costumers thinking tissues are free. Tip your head back a little- No, not that far! There we go.” He helps Dipper into the living room.

Mabel looks down towards the ground, and at the red, speckled drops left by her brother. She can still hear her grunkle talking to Dipper through the closed door. 

“Yeesh. This is what you get for trying to fight that sister of yours. How hard did she clock you at the show?”

“I got it Mabes,” Wendy tells her, gesturing at the blood, already moving towards the closet where Stan keeps the cleaning products of questionable brands. 

Mabel is silent, a million thoughts racing through her mind. Waddles bumps into her leg with his snout, alarmed by all the yelling. She sighs, and scratches behind his left ear. “It’s okay boy. Just didn’t think I’d need a plan B.”

\---

The next day, she waits eagerly in the living room, a glass full of Mabel Juice clutched to her chest. The homemade concoction- Pitt Cola, orange juice, some ice cubes, a plastic dinosaur, and maybe some mild sleeping pills she had found by Grunkle Stan’s bedside -all swish together, waiting for its victim. 

It doesn’t take long to hear her twin slinking down the stairs. He had been taking stairs slowly as of late, testing each step before he put his foot down and gripping the handrails as though his life depended on them.

“Hey bro bro! Want some new and improved Mabel Juice?”

He avoids meeting her hopeful eyes, and brushes past her, cradling his arms against his stomach. He’s in the same hoodie as yesterday. There are drops of blood stained down its front, a dull brownish crimson. “Not today Mabel. I have to, I have to go do something.”

“But Dipper, the secret ingredient is Pitt Cola! And I even left out the glitter this time!” but her pitch falls entirely on the wrong ears.

“Ooo, Pitt Cola!” Grunkle Stan exclaims, shuffling into the living room. He snatches the glass out of Mabel’s outstretched hand before she can react. “Don’t mind if I do!”

Mabel sighs.

Stan spends the majority of the day snoring in his mustardy, plaid armchair, waking up just before dinnertime. 

Dipper can hardly keep his eyes open over his lukewarm plate of canned ravioli. 

\---

After three days of failed attempts, Mabel comes up with a plan she is finally positively positive won’t fail. This plan, this absolute, last possible plan, was going to work for sure. At least Mabel hopes it will. She’s really running out of options, and judging by the dark circles under his eyes, so is Dipper. 

But she’s pretty hopeful, not that that’s a stretch for her. Blind optimism hasn’t failed her yet, and she doubts trying to coax her brother into sleeping is going to be what breaks the streak. 

It’s go time.

“I can’t sleep!” she announces. From across the attic Dipper startles. The journal falls from his grip. 

“Do you mind?” he bites out, crawling out of bed to retrieve the book. Tossing it onto his bed he angrily rips off his blood stained hoodie. Sweat beads off his forehead. 

“But Dipperrrrrr,” Mabel says, dragging out the end of his name, “Can’t the mysteries of Gravity Falls wait for just one night?” She bounces on the end of her bed, the feeble creak! of her mattress springs accenting each word.

Her brother sniffs in disdain, but she can’t help but notice the way his eyes snap shut as his left arm bumps against the stack of books balanced precariously on his bed. “No they can’t,” he practically hisses.

Mabel stares, and it dawns on her why he had been covering himself all week.

His arm was still covered in the brightly colored Sev’ral Timez band-aids she had applied after the show. Underneath them, she now assumes, still sits an array of small, swollen puncture marks, courtesy of demonic silverware. 

Mabel had only gotten to see Dipper’s injuries after catching him cursing weakly in the upstairs bathroom, a bottle of hydrogen peroxide in one hand, and a towel clenched between his teeth to make sure his sounds of distress would not be heard by anyone in the Shack. However, out of pain and sheer exhaustion, he had managed to skip the most important step in his operation – he hadn’t locked the door.

Fortunately for him- or unfortunately, depending on your point of view -it only took a couple seconds for Mabel to grab the boy band band-aids out from under the sink and plop him on the edge of the bathtub so she could fix him up.

(“Mabel?”

“Yeah Dip?”

“…don’t tell Grunkle Stan.” 

She had nodded, looking down at the bruises blossoming on her legs where he had collided with her during their brawl.)

Realizing she’s completely forgetting the lines she had been rehearsing for the last twenty minutes, Mabel looks back up at her brother’s face and forces a grin.

“Aw c’mon bro bro don’t be like that. Just fifteen minutes? Can’t you read me one of your Sibling Brothers books or something?”

“I don’t want to,” Dipper says, eyes fixated on the journal. “I just read the whole series, I don’t feel like rereading them again.” 

“Geez Dip, there are like, a gazillion of them. How’d you read them all?”

She can tell she’s already finding chinks in the armor. Her brother is smart, but she’s known him since before they were born. Like she said, twin telepathy is a real deal. Plus, he’s probably gotten five hours of sleep in the past week, so. 

“You know I’m a fast reader.”

“Not that fast, Dipper. Unless you haven’t been, I dunno,” she takes a deep breath, bracing for impact, “not sleeping for some gosh darn reason.”

He’s silent.

Mabel presses forward, taking his silence as an affirmation. “I know some pretty messed up stuff happened last week bro, but you need sleep. Like. Really really need it.”

She looks up, and is incredibly startled to see tears pooling in the corner of her brother’s eyes.

“I can’t,” he whispers, and it looks like he’s aged ten, twenty, fifty years and Mabel’s gut twists, because all this time she thought he was just being stubborn, but something is wrong, something is very wrong-

She drops out of her own bed and goes to wrap her brother in a semi-awkward, sibling hug.

“Don’t!” Dipper quickly moves backwards out of her reach, his body pressed to the wall. Tears are streaming down his face at this point. “Please don’t touch me, I- I don’t want to see.”

“See what? Dip, what’s going on?” This is bad, this is really bad. Mabel bites her lip, hard, ignoring the way her braces dig in. Her brother did not cry, like, ever. Only during sad Disney movies, or if something was seriously wrong, like that time he had appendicitis for a whole week, and their parents only found out after his dang appendix burst. 

“Everything, I can see everything, he’s still in me, I can’t get rid of him!”

Bill.

So it was definitely all thanks to the evil dorito. 

“That’s not possible Dip,” Mabel says (she doesn’t think it’s possible, she hopes it’s not possible.) She gingerly sits on the edge of her brother’s bed, making sure not to reach towards him. “You and I both watched him leave.” 

(Right?)

“But I still feel him,” Dipper cries. “There’s residual damage and I- I can’t get rid of him but I want to.”

Well, crud. Mabel’s knowledge of the supernatural was limited to what she’s already experienced here in Gravity Falls with her brother, and those old rom-com werewolf movies her mom kept in the downstairs closet.

She wishes it wasn’t this hard. She wishes her brother didn’t always seem to push himself like this. She wishes he didn’t have that stupid, magical journal to get into even more trouble than he did at home. And more than anything, she wishes she had just helped him with the password when he had asked.

“Mabel, what am I supposed to do? Every time I close my eyes he’s all I see. I can't keep my eyes open but I have to.” 

She can practically feel the desperation in her brother’s voice, as he struggles to control his labored breathing. 

Okay. So she was in way over head. She had no idea if there was still a dream demon possessing her brother’s body, and if he was how long he was going to stay there. She didn’t know how she was supposed to get him out. But what she did know was that her brother was exhausted. He had been dealing with this with far too little sleep, and far, far too little support from his alpha twin. Gosh dang it, she was going to help him even if it was the last thing she did!

“Bro bro, are you sure he’s still in there? Maybe you’re just scared. Remember when I thought Oprah was a murderer? Mom and Dad had to put a parental lock on her station so no one would accidentally click on it, because the second she came on the screen I started screaming?”

Dipper finally looks at her, although the look on his face is more confused than relieved. “What does- what does that have to do with anything?”

Mabel laughs, loud and long. “It’s kind of the same thing, honest! And I mean, Bill Cipher-” Dipper flinches “-is a lot more powerful than Oprah Winfrey. He basically feeds off of fear and stuff. You probably built up so much of it, and all this scary stuff that keeps happening is just because you’re worried.”

Dipper shakes his head, and tries to argue. “But, what if it’s more than that? What if he’s still in my head, waiting?”

“Dip, at any point in the last week have you been removed from your body? At any point?”

Her brother quickly shakes his head once more.

Boom.

Logic.

“See? You’ve been reading that journal like a madman, if he could still take control of you, he would have done it and grabbed that thing days ago.”

“That’s true,” Dipper whispers, his body practically deflating as his panic melts away. 

“Besides if he could still use everybody he ever possessed, why would he have needed to make a deal with you? He could have just popped into Joe Shmoe or whoever’s body and come beat you up like that!”

She waits for him to argue, but it doesn’t happen. Instead, he leans forward, placing his head on her shoulder. “Thank you.”

“Oh Dip, c’mere!” Mabel wraps her arms around him, and pulls him in for the most calming hug she can manage.

“Mabel I,” Dipper starts, before going silent. 

“It’s okay bro bro,” Mabel says, trying to soothe him with a gentle pat pat. “I know.”

“No it’s just- you’re kind of crushing my bad arm. I think Bill broke it.”

“Oh. Sheesh.” She lets go, but keeps a hand on his right shoulder, steadying him. “We should probably go tell Grunkle Stan. We’ll make up something. Say I accidentally hit you with a golf club!”

It wouldn’t have been the first time.

Dipper looks down and sniffles, but Mabel is pleased to see his face is already a bit more relaxed. “Can it- can it wait until the morning? I’m kind of tired.”

Mabel nods. “Sure thing, Dipping Sauce. I think you need it.” She moves to go back to her own bed, but is stopped by her brother’s shaking hand.

“Could you, maybe spend the night over here? Just. Just in case I have a bad dream?”

She returns to where she was sitting before, yanking his pillow over so she can lie down. “Duh. What else are twins for?”

Dipper adjusts, pulling the blanket out from underneath himself and his stack of books, tossing it onto her. 

“Here, because I know you’re going to steal it while you’re sleeping anyway.”

“Yeah yeah yeah, whatever nerd.”

That’s where a concerned Grunkle Stan finds them the next afternoon, when they aren’t down for breakfast or lunch. 

“We were trying to see if we could share dreams!” Mabel tells him when he asks where they've been, giving her well-rested brother a tiny smirk. “Twin telepathy, and all that jazz.”


End file.
